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Dear Parish Faithful,
Exhort One Another Daily (Heb 3.13)
Observe the gentleness and mildness: he did not say “rebuke” but “exhort.” In this way we are required to bear ourselves toward those who are straitened by affliction. This he says also in the writing to the Thessalonians (1 Thess 5), “Comfort the feebleminded, support the weak, be patient toward all men;” that is, do not cease to hope; do not despair. For he who does not encourage one who is straitened by affliction makes him more hardened... Then he suggests hope to them, saying we are “partakers of Christ”; all but saying, he who loved us, he who counted us worthy of such great things as to make us his body, will not suffer us to perish... We and Christ are one; let us not then distrust him. ...”If we endure, we shall also reign with him” (2 Tim 2.12).
—St John Chrysostom, Homily VI on Hebrews III, as found in The Bible and the Holy Fathers for Orthodox
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St. John offers the greatest of advice here for those who are also fellow-pastors. There can be quite a difference between a "rebuke" and an "exhortation." As we enter the third week of Great Lent, all I can do as a pastor, is to "exhort" one and all to complete the course of the Fast with both seriousness and humility; remembering that we are a community upholding and caring for one another as "partakers of Christ."
